Ground Command - Star Wars: Legion

Wednesday, March 9, 2016

Battle of the J's! This week the big match-up we will be covering is between the Juggernaut himself, and regular booth commentator JJs Juggernaut - team captain of "Bacta the Future", and relative unknown Jarenis, team member of "Church of Rocco".

Tie Advanced
JJs Juggernaut brings less deployments and activations by a single ship, and almost no long range firepower to the table. He does however had better close quarters attacks, and more than enough of a bid for first player. His fighter support should be sufficient to handle the Rogues from Jarenis, though Bossk is a limiting factor for speed and response from the VSD1 activations. Screed improves the damage output from each ship.

The Match-up:

Again, JJs wins the initiative bid easily, and would probably be expected to choose first player, both based on his list and the advantages First Player gives a Black dice build. He can probably expect favorable objectives from Jarenis as well, and he's unlikely to want to give Jarenis first and last activation. Jarenis on the other hand has deployments (7 to 6) an activations (5 to 4) to give him a little bit of dictation on how and when the engagements occur, and can gain advantage on JJs by simply keeping the fight to long range.

For squadrons, one can reliably expect JJs to be using his squadrons with activations from the VSD, and Jarenis to wait until squadron phase to make use of the Rogue keyword. In the end, this likely favors JJs, though Bossky Bossk is a bit slower than the rest ,and can lead to a mismatch, or a round or two of un-opposed anti-ship fire if not handled properly

Keys to the Game:

1) Engagement Distance - JJs is going to want to get in close, and while Jarenis can contribute some close quarters firepower, most of his anti-ship investment is in multiple long range shots. If he can keep JJs at long range, or force him to close at bad times or piecemeal - keep the engagement on his terms - he can come out on top of the exchange.

2) Objective Play - Like most games, the choice of objectives by both sides should have a profound impact, either forcing Jarenis into close range with JJ's ships or allowing a long range engagement to take place.

3) Good Trades - Because he has to close in to engage, JJs needs to be careful that when he jumps into the brawl, he doesn't lose his own ships. Each of his heavy hitters is worth more points than the less pricey CR90As that Jarenis brought, and only the Raider is less expensive than the non-flagship MC30c. If JJs is forced to trade ship for ship, he comes up on the bottom of the exchange. If he can win the fighter game, this can even out a bit, but 1 for 1 trades will not.

Biggs' Pre-Match Bet:

This has the chance to be a close match-up, though JJs is a well known veteran and one of the more difficult players to deal with in the tournament, and Jarenis is an unknown quantity. I personally think that there aren't any of the "Keys to the Game" that JJs Juggernaut won't be able to deal with, and predict that he takes this one.